Archive for the ‘local music’ Category

2. My ability to make it from home to work without spilling coffee on myself.

3. The “fact” that local Indie rocker’s Le Loup have only played a rumored two “real” shows together.

I’ve been to Arlington’s Iota Club a fair amount of times. Never have I not been able to, at the very least, easily walk in the door after flashing my horrid driver’s license picture, especially on a Monday night. So I was nearly floored when I moseyed my way up Wilson Blvd. around 9:15 pm and straight into a fortification of concert-goers. Some of them were howling, as Le Loup’s mascot seems to be a stately wolf (the kind found on t-shirts in every gas station on the Pennsylvania Turnpike); and others were just trying to not spill beer, as there was virtually little to no bottle-to-mouth room.

As they played for an hour, with no encore (the group literally played every one of their songs), I tried to draw up an accurate description of the band that literally came out of nowhere and packed Iota like the lot of them were scantily clad and giving away free jello shots. Inevitably someone will ask me “who they sound like” and I like to have an answer ready. So here is my answer. I heard a little Silversun Pickups and then that led to a little Cat Empire, which made way for drum intros not unlike the techniques of Wilco’s Glenn Kotche. Then I gave up because comparison is not always the best depiction. Le Loup is a colossal brick wall of experimental indie; seven people band-ed together (with a beamy French horn), a quality not all collaborating musicians achieve in a live show. Correction: in their second live show.

If the rumors are indeed true, then Le Loup is way ahead. So ahead even that I was not the least bit annoyed that lead singer Sam Simkoff sported his own band’s wolf imprinted t-shirt, a vice that I believe to be in the Top 10 Rock & Roll Don’ts of All Time. Check out the surpassing of rules at myspace.com/leloupmusic.